The Blessing of Giving

Thank you for subscribing to the Shepherds Church podcast. This is our Lord's Day Sermon. We pray that as we declare the Word of God that you would be encouraged Strengthened in your faith and that you would catch a greater vision of who Christ is.

May you be blessed in the hearing of God's Word and may the Lord be with you. Our giving testifies to our values. Our giving our money says a lot about what we prioritize what we love and what even we worship.

Treasure, Worship, and the Problem of Money

For it is Jesus himself who said where your treasure is there your heart will be also and Because prayerfully. We want to have the heart of God. Because we want to have affections that are centered on Jesus Christ.

Because we want to worship in a way that is pleasing To the Spirit. We want our treasure. To be aligned with him. We want him to be our great treasure. So We have to talk about money. Now to my knowledge, this is the first sermon that we've talked about money directly at the Shepherds Church.

We've been three years as a church and we have not spoken about this concept. Isn't that fascinating? But how we handle our finances how we handle money says a lot about what we think about God and about worship.

Our money will either serve God or we will serve our money. Our money will either serve God or we will serve our money for it was Jesus who said no one can serve two masters for either he will hate the one and love the other or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other.

You cannot serve both God and money. So we need sermons that talk about this. We need sermons that from a Christian and from a biblical perspective talk about how do we handle something so basic to our lives?

We interact with money and assets and finance every day of our life in some way or another and because of the. The way that payment systems have become so easy. We deal with it multiple times a day. We don't have to carry around loads of coins.

Now. You can send payments digitally instantly. We need a theology Of how to deal with something like money. Now we have to follow the word. That's what this church is all about. It's what all churches are supposed to be about.

We need to follow what the Word of God says, even if it makes us uncomfortable. Especially if it makes us uncomfortable and requires radical changes in our life. So now for the next two weeks, we're gonna cover this topic.

The reason it's two weeks is because it would have been an 80-minute sermon if it was one week. So about Friday, I decided this has to be two. Today, all we're going to do is we're gonna provide a foundation for the topic.

We're gonna go back into the Old Testament. We're gonna look at the Old Testament tithe. We're gonna look at the Old Testament system of giving and our goal today is just to see what can we learn as a Foundation that we can build upon next week so with that.

Will you pray with me? Will you join me? So we're gonna be a little bit all over the place today. We're not gonna read from a specific scripture. Let us go to the word and let us go to the Lord Father, thank you so much.

As we see all throughout the scriptures that we give because you first gave. That we Hold everything that we have in open hands that truly nothing belongs to us. Because the very air that we breathe the material reality around us was all created out of nothing by you and it's all yours.

Lord let us today. Let us today not see a message or a or scriptures where we walk away thinking that if I can do this If I can just give more then God will love me more. Lord, let us not walk away from here today that if we say things like If I give more than I'll get more which is what so many in the prosperity gospel say Lord I pray just a very simple prayer.

That you would be our chief affection that you would be our treasure that we wouldn't cling to trinkets and and Finances and assets and that those things wouldn't grab hold of us, but we would hold our hands open and we would say God I'll give whatever you want me to give.

I'll receive whatever you want me to receive. I'm just want to have you. I Want you more than anything else. Lord, will you help that to be our heart? It's in Christ's name. We pray. Amen. Now you may be asking why are we doing a sermon on this now seems abrupt maybe you're thinking well.

We're having a membership meeting today. We're talking about a finalized budget. Well, that's why he's talking about it. Maybe it's the beginning of the year and last year's budget wasn't quite what we were thinking and now that's why he's not.

We wanted to talk about this last year in the true church series. But it just we didn't have enough Weeks to be able to do it because we would have been then running into Christmas and we wanted to do the songs of Christmas Series so badly that we decided to put this off until this time.

So Now we're doing it here. Before we get back to John and we will be back in John soon and I am looking forward to being back in John because I love that book so much. But we could not do a church on true or we cannot do a series on the true church without talking about money.

The Bible just talks too much about it. The Bible is not afraid of talking about money. Jesus himself talks about it a lot. Paul talks about it all over the place. Money is important concept for the church because whether we like it or not, we live in a world where things cost and the kingdom of God is Contributed to and built upon the generosity of the Saints and the building of Christ so we have to look at it and To do that, we're gonna go back first into the Old Testament.

We're gonna look at tithe. What is a tithe? We think well, it's 10 Yeah, but it's so much more than that though 10 is not adequate to describe what we see in the Old Testament. It's actually 10 of a lot of different things that are all culminating together into like 25 -30 of their giving was to God and it was for the building up of his church.

So we have to go to the Bible discover that we have to go to the Old Testament to discover that and what I found So interesting when I was reading this I read every passage in the Old Testament on giving and all of them are connected to worship.

Every single one of them when it talks about giving it talks about worship. It does not talk about giving in some rote formulaic Duty bound obedience it talks about it in the sense of joyful loving God worshipping him with all of our heart soul mind strength wallet fields lands, etc.

For instance when the tabernacle is installed. It talks about giving. The worship of God happens at the tabernacle and then immediately is talking about giving. When the temple was built. It talks about giving when the temple was burned down Destroyed 70 years left vacant and then the people of God come back and they rebuild the temple under Ezra.

They rebuild the city of Jerusalem under under Nehemiah. It talks about giving dedication. And the reason I think is because giving and worship are connected when we say that we love God and Yet we hold so tightly to our stuff.

It says something about the way that we worship. If we truly worship God, we will realize that nothing in this life belongs to us not even our blood cells. Every facet of our being belongs to God and the Bible is going to tell us exactly What to believe about giving and what to do about Giving.

And again, I want to make it very clear before we even get to these passages. Everything we have belongs to God. The paper that we print our money on belongs to God. The boards we build our houses with belong to God.

The automobiles that we drive praise God for Henry Ford and for the Industrial Revolution Are owned by God. The energy and the ATP a denison triphosphate that wakes you up in the morning and Takes you to work and brings you home and is why you receive a paycheck.

Belongs to God. The chemical processes in your body belong to God, isn't that a fascinating thing? Without his material world we could do say think believe nothing. So we own nothing. The body that we work so hard to craft and to sculpt.

The body that we use to labor none of it. Thank you. All of that belongs to God and I would say even more than that it's a hundred percent God. But it's also a hundred percent grace. That we're allowed to keep anything that we have.

If you think about it, it's a tremendous grace that God gave us anything. He made these creatures from the dirt. He put them in a garden that they didn't deserve. He gave them gift upon gift upon gift the greatest gift of all was his presence in their life and they turn their back on him and Instead of destroying them instead of wiping away creation he allowed the Sun to shine on their fallen backs.

Eventually, he would allow the rain to water their fallow fields. God has been exceedingly generous to us who are fallen creatures in that he gives us anything. It's his world. It's his resources. So when God in the Bible says I'm gonna give you All these blessings and I'm only gonna ask that you give a small portion back to me.

He's being exceedingly gracious. I Thought about an example of this. Let's say you walk out of here today and you are going about your business you're on your way home, maybe and Somebody comes up to you and says I have a gift.

I would like to give you. They say I'm gonna give you a million dollars. Some of your eyes just got really wide. And he says I only have one catch. I'm gonna give you a million dollars. But I want you to give me a hundred thousand back in return.

We'd be like, yeah. Sign me up for that. Where's that guy been all my life? And yeah, why don't we treat God that way. He gives us everything and yet we hold so tightly to small numbers. I Can never give 10 of my income to the Lord.

Well, that was the Old Testament beginning of giving. That wasn't even the end of it. And if you really think about it really think about it if everything belongs to God 10 seems like a really small number does it not?

All of it is his and Yet he's asked for so little and what we will see is That in that giving God actually outgives us. That when we give to him, he actually gives us more in return. He asked for crumbs from us.

And yet we often we run up our credit cards. We max out our standard of living by having a mortgage payment that just puts us at the edge of reasonability. We eat higher and higher budgets. We have entertainment allowances.

Can you think about the Christians who lived in the first century? Hey, brother Simon, how much is your entertainment balance or your entertainment budget? I Don't know. I'm gonna be fed to a lion next week.

Someone else's entertainment budget. We get swimming pools and vacation homes and none of those things are bad if those things don't own us. But oftentimes the things we own end up owning us. The things we have end up having us.

We become consumed and preoccupied with the things of the world. Why. Do we do that. Because at the root of the matter. We forget all of us. We forget that everything is God's. When we walk out of here today, we will intellectually mentally and even physically with our bodies.

We will acknowledge that everything belongs to the Lord and we will live like everything belongs to us. We will live like everything we have was earned by our ingenuity in our incredible experience. We don't live like the million-dollar man the devil really has twisted our thinking on this topic now when we get to the Old Testament.

We're gonna see a God who gives lavishly. This is the way God models for us how he wants us to behave. He does for us what he expects us to do back to him. He never commands us to do something that he's not doing for us.

So he gives us lavishly and Then calls us to give sparingly. We see that God in these passages that we're gonna look at expects us to be sacrificial in our giving. I have a standard in my home. I don't put a number on it.

But I say if I'm not giving until it hurts then it's not sacrificial. If I'm not giving until I have to look at my budget and say what can I cut this year? Then I'm not giving in a way that I See here in the Bible and I see in the scriptures.

The Old Testament Tithe and Sacrificial Giving

The tithe again was a 10 commandment on all kinds of things we're gonna begin in Leviticus 27 30 through 32. Which we read earlier. This is a tithe of the seeds and the fruits and the flocks. This is what it says.

Thus all the tithe of the land of the seeds of the land or the fruit of the land is the Lord's. It is holy to the Lord. It is therefore if therefore man wishes to redeem part of his tithe. He shall add one-fifth to it.

For every tenth part of the herd of the flock whatever passes under the rod the tenth one shall be holy unto the Lord. Now what I love about this passage is we have to remember the context. Leviticus.

They've just come out of slavery they just come out of 400 years of being bound in chains and whipped on their backs in Egypt. They're being promised a land that they didn't work for. God says you're gonna enter this land.

I'm gonna give it to you. You didn't even work for it. You're gonna live in houses that you didn't build. You're going to reap the the vineyard crop that you didn't plant. This year that God was promising them this when you go into the land you will have everything.

So give back to me a tenth. Give back to me a tenth. What a small request for people who were just slaves people were just broke penniless. They were the ones who were sitting on the street with a 10 cup saying I need some pennies.

And now God has given them a bounty of blessings and he says give me back ten percent. Give me ten percent of your land and I'll give you total freedom. Give me ten percent of your seeds. And give them to the temple ten percent of your fruits and ten percent of your flocks and What we see in that this is I think the most astounding thing is When they give their seeds their flocks their animals God gives them back more than they gave to him in the first place.

When they give ten percent of their wealth to God he gives back priceless gifts in return. If you think about the million-dollar example that I shared a minute ago a silly example, it would be like this Kendall can I give you a million dollars?

I'm interested. You'll have to give me a hundred thousand in return sign me up and For that hundred thousand dollars. I'm gonna give you something that's absolutely priceless. That has value beyond anything you could imagine.

So do you see what's happened here? I've went from being broke To nine hundred thousand dollars positive and now with something else added on top of that that's absolutely priceless. What this is teaching us is that we actually cannot out give God.

Because when they gave him ten percent of their land He gave them freedom that they never had when they gave them the seeds of their land. He gave them abundant crops and abundant fruits when he gave when they gave them the flocks He gave them fruitful and multiplying flocks and it's just not just material blessings.

He said if you do these things and you come to my temple I will be your God and I will live and dwell among you. The greatest blessing that they ever received was his presence. So that we give to God he always gives more.

When we open up our hands and say Lord, what do you want me to give? He always meets us with greater blessings. This is a fun when 10 of their fragrant oils. They had to give. It says in Deuteronomy 14 22 through 23, you shall surely tithe all of the produce from what you sow.

Which comes out of the field every year so that you shall eat in the presence of the Lord. You see the blessing. Give be in God's presence at the place where he chooses to establish his name the tithe of your grain your new wine your oil.

The firstborn of your herd and of your flock so that you may learn to fear the Lord your God always. Now there's some overlap. There's some things that we've already talked about like herds and flocks and things like that.

But it also says to tithe your oil. All my homeschool mom's here. You're young living Frankincense oil on your on your counter if you were in the Old Testament. You'd give a tenth of that to the Lord your tea tree oil that you mix when you have heartburn.

When a little bit of water, sorry, my wife has oils. I know something of the matter. You would tithe those oils to the Lord. Everything because this is what it's teaching us. Everything belongs to God everything that touches your hands belongs to him and we give back to him joyfully.

God explains his radical generosity for why he does this in the passage and it's not for him. He doesn't ask us to give because he's in need. He doesn't ask us to give because he wants something from us.

He asked us to give because he wants to give something to us. This is what he says. I Mean, oh, that's sorry. That was my quote the text Says so that you may learn to fear the Lord your God always. God was asking him to give their flocks their oils their wines their Stuff to him so that they would learn to fear him.

Why? Because worship and giving are connected when you give something from your bounty as A fallen creature it strikes at you. It gnaws at you a little bit because we're all broken. When the people of Israel were told you can gather manna six days a week.

But on the seventh day you cannot gather. Do you see what happened to them? They went crazy. They sat in their living room and they're like, how are we gonna eat today? And they went out and they gathered on the wrong day just as God had told them.

Why did God tell them that was in an arbitrary rule? No, he gave them that so they would trust him. So they would learn to fear him so that they would learn to see that he is their provider. By us giving to God and by giving to his ministry.

We're not adding to God's happiness. God is infinitely happy. We're not giving to God's wallet. God has everything you can't give him something. That's not his. There's no Adam in the universe that you could give to God and he'd say thank you so much.

I needed that. We give to God because we need to give to God we need to learn how to trust him. It's it's a way of God taking out the scalpel and severing your heart from your stuff. Giving causes us to be more joyful giving causes us to trust God more.

Because there's times where a budget just doesn't make sense to us. We look at it and we say all right, I've already cut out Netflix and Hulu and everything else I don't have space for it. It doesn't make sense.

We have faith in and give to God again. Not because God's in need. That's not what this message is about. I Remember when I was convicted of this. I was a brand-new Christian and I was convicted that I needed to give to the Lord and The number on my mind at that time was 10

It's a good number in the Bible. So I just I did that and I wept because I was like, I don't know how I'm gonna pay my mortgage. I never ran out. Now the prosperity gospel will tell you if you give then you'll be riding around in a Maserati soon.

It wasn't like that either. When God says he'll meet our needs he doesn't say he'll meet he'll meet our wants. My money went further than it ever went before because I gave it to God. My anxiety went down.

Imagine that My anxiety went down because I gave it to God. There's something intrinsic about us giving in our worship that's connected together that if we will trust God God will come through. The tithe teaches us that God lavishly provides on his people who give sparingly and He covers them and he cares for them.

It's all throughout the Bible and many people will twist these verses like the prosperity gospel. People will twist these verses and they will make it be like if you give then you'll be blessed materially.

That's not what I'm saying. But there is a connection that if you give God will take care of you and he will meet your needs. It says in 2nd Chronicles 31 5 through 10. This is in Hezekiah's time. It says as soon.

This is another type of tithe by the way. As soon as the order spread the sons of Israel provided an abundance the first fruits of their grain new wine. Oil honey and of all the produce of the field and they brought it abundantly.

The tithe of all the sons of Israel and Judah. Who lived in the cities of Judah also brought in the tithe of the oxen and the sheep and the tithe of the sacred gifts? Which were consecrated to the Lord and they placed them in heaps.

I love that passage. They went to the church and whatever coffers they had to put their giving in was too small. So they heaped it. We don't even know what that means as far as sigh. I mean they heaped it.

I love that in the third month they began to make the heaps and Finish them by the seventh month four months of additional heaps. That's crazy. When Hezekiah and the ruler came and saw the heaps. Mother that's what they call it.

They're like, I don't know what to call this big mound. When Hezekiah and the rulers came and saw the heaps they blessed God or they blessed the Lord in his people Israel. Then Hezekiah questioned the priest and the Levites concerning the heaps.

Azariah the chief priest of the house of Zadok said to him. Since the contributions began to be brought into the house of the Lord. We've had enough to eat with plenty left over. For the Lord has blessed his people and this great quantity has been left over.

What a beautiful image. Congregation a nation of people who are not addicted to their stuff. Who are so providing for the Lord that it's heaped. We see the same thing in the book of Exodus where they're told to bring their gold and their silver and their jewels.

Do you remember when they left Egypt? God had rained down ten plagues on top of the Egyptians head and the Egyptians went to the Israelites and they're like take our stuff. Go we want you out. They gave him their gold.

They gave him their jewels. They gave him their rings. They give him their necklaces and the Israelites are like, all right. How quickly though would it be a temptation to say this free gift that we got is ours.

We're gonna cling to it, but they didn't do it. God said that I want you to take that and give it to the consecration of the tabernacle and it got so generous. That it says and we've talked about this verse before that God said stop we have enough.

How often have we been in prayer with God? We've been in the scripture and We clearly understood that our giving was so lavish. That it was irresponsible and wanton and it would be a good idea to stop.

I Don't think I've ever given that way. I want to give that way. It says even though they were giving everything nobody went hungry. God provides. We cannot out give God. Because God always gives more than we do when you give extravagantly.

God provides for you lavishly and it's not always material blessings. Again, this is not name it and claim it theology. We just simply trust that God will provide our needs and again our needs are not mansions and Maserati's.

Those are often the things that we need to get rid of because they've got a hold of us. You'd be surprised at how quickly things can get a hold of you. I can buy a watch that's like $15 and I can that's a really good-looking watch and all of a sudden I have pride.

I'm like, it looks like it's 150 our phones our televisions our stuff our cars we can become so consumed with these things that they put their hooks in us and Then they own us and they have us and then before you know it we're living for the next thing.

Instead of God giving severs the hook from the flesh and causes you to trust God. Jesus tells us about this in Matthew 6 33. He says but seek first his kingdom and his righteousness and all these things everything else will be added to you.

Our life is not about us seeking our castles to build our castles. Our life is about the kingdom of Almighty God. When you get to the end of your life, it's not gonna matter if you got 15 promotions. If you get to the end of your life, it's not gonna matter.

How much money you've got in your bank account that you can give to your ancestors or your progeny? When you get to the end of your life. It's not gonna matter what your what your 401k looks like when you get to the end of your life.

It's not gonna matter how much stuff you had. That's gonna end up in garage sales and junkyards for moth and rust to eat. You get to the end of your life and you hear well done my good and faithful servant.

Did you build the kingdom? Did you invest in the kingdom because if you do the promise is here that he will meet your needs. Again, you might not live a life of luxury. But what will that buy you? Jesus says moth and rust eat that.

That's not the hope. The hope is that we've invested in God's kingdom. Being rich in God rich in his mercy seeing people come to life seeing the kingdom expand. That's our that's why we're here. That's why Jesus didn't zap us out of here.

That's why he leaves us here is to build his kingdom. Again that's why this church was even founded. I've got a chance and I'm not. I know this is not scripture what I'm sharing with you right now. It's anecdotal.

So just forgive me, but it's it's my experience. I know my testimony is not the Bible, right? But when we planted this church the thing that bothered me the most about it, I'm gonna be completely honest with you is money.

I Was at a nice Evangelical job as a discipleship pastor. I was making enough money to cover my bills and save a little extra and Then Lord put this church on my heart and on Derek's heart and the first thing that I thought was fear.

Over how am I gonna be able to provide for my family? I Carried that fear for nine straight months till it was a burden that was choking me. It felt like a noose around my neck because I wasn't yet ready to trust God that if I stepped out he would provide he Would rescue he would help he would cover.

I Couldn't see it practically. When the finally like Jeremiah says that it was like a fire inside me that had to get out. When I finally realized that God wasn't gonna let me alone and I stepped out I quit my job.

I had one month of severance to figure something out and We were on. Early, my family was on the John Bon Jovi budget. We were living on a prayer. But what I found is That every single time we had a need God met it.

It is ridiculous and this is not what the sermons about. It's ridiculous the stories that I have of God meeting my needs my family's needs and I'm not unique. You look at men like George Mueller read his biography that man Lived on prayer and God provided for his needs.

You look at every saint who who went out into fear and uncertainty and into the void and God provided. I remember early Pastor Derek was giving all of his energy and effort to raising a brand new family brand new kids.

Working a full-time job. Sometimes 40 50 plus hours a week and also given full-time hours to the church and God multiplied his efforts. God multiplied his time. What I'm saying is if we will trust God with us God will provide.

I've seen it too many times I've seen it now. I share that to encourage you and I shun. I'll share that To say that we did everything right? We certainly did not but I share that to encourage you. You cannot out give God.

You can't give yourself into a place where God can't provide for you. You just can't that's why the scripture always tells us To give sacrificially to give joyfully because when you give joyfully you're expecting God to come through.

It also tells us in the Old Testament that they were giving For the good of the temple. They weren't just giving because God told them to give they were giving for the good of the temple. It says in Numbers 18 21 through 24.

To the sons of Levi behold, I've given all the tithe in Israel for an inheritance in Return for their service which they perform. The service of the tents of meeting the sons of Israel shall not come near the tent of meeting again, or they will bear the sin and I only the Levite shall perform the service of the tent of meeting and they shall bear their iniquity and It shall be a perpetual statute throughout your generations and among the sons of Israel that they they shall have no inheritance for the tithe Of the sons of Israel, which they offers an offering to the Lord.

I have given to the Levites in for an inheritance. Therefore I have said concerning them. They shall have no inheritance among the sons of Israel. What I love about this is it ties everything that we've learned together now.

All the seeds all the produce all the land all the wine all the oil. Everything is to be given to the temple so that the mission of God the missio day can go forward. The Levites think about the vulnerability that they felt.

I'm not gonna give you an inheritance with the rest of the sons of Israel you Have to rely on the generosity of your brothers the ministry. The oil that went into the the the little incense altars the bread that was on the table.

Everything the sacrifices was provided by the people so that the ministry of God could go forward and as far as I can tell There is no verse in the New Testament that that goes against that because it's the same case today.

We don't give our fruit anymore. It'd be a little strange and we wouldn't have anywhere to put it. We would have heaps as well. But and when we give to the ministry of the church, we are giving to people who are working to love and care for you and serve you and pray for you and and Minister to you and all of us together are giving our best to God so that we can see his kingdom built.

That's what it's here in the Old Testament. It's here in the New Testament. We're giving to see the kingdom of God expand. Because look around you. We live in a world that is failing and broken and the ministry is too important to leave it ill-equipped and underfunded.

We're gonna hand this generation off to our children. What's it gonna look like? Are we gonna see the kingdom of God advancing? Are we gonna see it failing? I think a lot of that has to do with how we view.

Something so simple as giving we see in the Bible that there's a blessing from God when we give and the blessing of God is. That the ministry of God goes forward the tie that existed in the Old Covenant to build up the church.

And it's the same in the New Covenant as well. It says in Exodus 25 2 through 8 tell the sons of Israel to raise a contribution for me. From every man whose heart moves him and shall raise my contribution.

This is the contribution which you shall which you are to raise from them. Gold and silver and bronze blue and purple scarlet material fine linen goat hair very fancy back in those days ram skin dyed red porpoise skin a casea wood oil for lighting spices for the anointing oil and for the fragrant incense onyx stones and The settings for the ephod and the breastplate let them construct a sanctuary for me that I may dwell among them.

Do you see how it's connected with worship do all this give all this and I will dwell among them. And if you want to read something that's riveting, I mean like Lord of the Rings riveting. Read Exodus 25 through 28 on the details of the temple and you're like that's boring.

No, it's not. God gives detail after detail about how he desires to be worshiped and What a privilege it was for the people of God to be able to give towards that. It wasn't just expenses it was to encourage their senses as they walked into the presence of God.

Do you see which detail God gives that their nose would smell the incense that their mouth would taste the bread that they would touch The the gold in the in the tabernacle and they would see every sense every faculty.

They're being would be experienced the presence of God. God did not build a mediocre tabernacle or temple. He built something that all of them would be engaged with and so that the community could give towards so they could see Them and their gospel of the Old Testament be a light to the Gentiles and the same is true for us today we give and God is gracious.

We give to ministry so that the kingdom can be built. It wasn't just oil and Incense and gold and jewels, but it was also Currency. The first time that I can see in the Bible that actually deals with shiny metal currency is Exodus 30 verse 11 through 16 and this was the temple tax if you remember Jesus Tells them to put a hook in the water.

They pull out the fish and they have a shekel in the fish's mouth and he says give this for me and Peter. That's what he's doing. He's doing the temple tax. Every man in Israel had to pay the temple tax.